I'm just interest to see where they go with the next Halo, by far Reach was my favourite story in terms of characters and dramatic feel, I hope they add the same scale to Halo 4 and it's it's Master Chief again give him some soul.

I would like to see what planet he was floating towards at the end of 3 anyway.

I really hope they just make the kill times and general game speed like Halo 1 and Halo 2. The kill times where pretty fast but not CoD fast and gave you enough time to think on your feet and turn the tables or escape if you knew some jumps or locations.

In Halo 3 and Reach it was just WAY too long for the kill times and thanks to no hit scan the BR in Halo 3 was worthless and the Bloom of Reach just makes me mad :(

dramatic innovations and slight tweaks... what!? it doesnt make sense, kind of contradictory.. slight tweaks implies that the game wont be changed much but instead refined, whereas dramatic innovations implies that the game will be changed drastically..

Slight tweaks = adding deployable equipment button, refining dual wielding etc. If you tweak two much, it won't be the same game anymore. For example, adding "iron sights" to halo like you have in COD, Killzone and battlefield is more then a slight tweak and changes the game mechanics completely.

dramatic innovation = Xbox live support in Halo 2, adding forge mode & theater mode in Halo 3 etc. These are not related to game mechanics, but instead add something else and do something that wasn't done before. I must say that while Halo Reach is the most refined game in the series, it was probably the first one that didn't offer any dramatic innovation over the previous games in the series.

I'm hoping by "dramatic innovations" they mean it won't be a direct sequel in terms of gameplay.

While 343 does have several ex-Bungie devs, I'd prefer them to try something a bit different to advance the series and prevent comparisons to Bungie's games.

Otherwise it can end up a bit like the Harry Potter movies where despite the same ingredients and cast the changes in director / crew can make the series a bit schizophrenic and invite direct comparisons between titles.

I wouldn't mind something covering the initial encounter with the Covenant, preferably more in tone with Halo 1 in the sense of awe, mystery and suspense rather than the action-movie approach of Halo 2 onwards.

"Frank O'Connor said he doesn't think the Halo series needs to be taken in a radical new direction... it just needs to go "deeper"."

Someone's been watching Inception ...

But no seriously, all joking aside, I like where they are headed with this. 343i is really striking me a studio capable of delivering another quality installment to the Halo franchise.

And I like that fact that they are sitting down at the table and looking at what each successive Halo brought to the industry instead of just saying "Hey, guys, let's throw together another Halo!". It means they've got their own plans for bringing some new and unique stuff to the table.

Hopefully they'll take us back to roots. Back to being a badass Super Soldier afraid of nothing. Give us bigger battles, stronger foes, awesome weapons, give use back the Golden Triangle. Make the old Halo Veterans weep with joy at the mere mention of our beloved franchise.

And notice, Frank doesn't seem all that worried about the hardware, that's cause they have Corrine Yu and a bunch of other talented Techies behind the realm in Engineering.

Well whatever the case I just hope they start from scratch and ditch the old re gutted Halo engine with a new one. In my eyes Bungie tried to Kill Halo and now 343 will be it's savior and give us hopefully the best version yet since part 1.